Houston-area scientists headed to Antarctica to study...

1of4This undated handout photo provided by NASA shows the Thwaites Glacier in West Antarctic. Two new studies indicate that part of the huge West Antarctic ice sheet is starting a slow collapse in an unstoppable way. Alarmed scientists say that means even more sea level rise than they figured. (AP Photo/NASA)Photo: Associated Press

2of4This July 4, 2012 image provided by Ian Joughin, shows surface melt water rushing along the surface of the Greenland Ice Sheet through a supra-glacial stream channel, southwest of Ilulissat, Greenland. Polar ice sheets are now melting three times faster than in the 1990s, but so far that's added just less than half an inch to already rising global sea levels, a new giant scientific study says. While the amount of sea level rise isn't as bad as some earlier worst case scenarios, the acceleration of the melting, especially in Greenland, has ice scientists worried. (AP Photo/Ian Joughin)Photo: Ian Joughin, HONS / Associated Press

3of4EMBARGOED UNTIL 2 PM. EST, THURSDAY, NOV. 29 - This handout image provided by Ian Joughin, shows two people looking at this 60-foot-deep canyon that was carved over the course of several years by turbulent water overflow from a large melt lake southwest of Ilulissat, Greenland on July 3, 2010. Polar ice sheets are now melting three times faster than in the 1990s, but so far that's added just less than half an inch to already rising global sea levels, a new giant scientific study says. While the amount of sea level rise isn't as bad as some earlier worst case scenarios, the acceleration of the melting, especially in Greenland, has ice scientists worried (AP Photo/Ian Joughin)Photo: Ian Joughin, HO / Associated Press

4of4FILE - In this July 19, 2007 file photo an iceberg is seen off Ammassalik Island in Eastern Greenland. A new assessment of climate change in the Arctic shows the ice in the region is melting faster than previously thought and sharply raises projections of global sea level rise this century. (AP Photo/John McConnico, File)Photo: JOHN MCCONNICO, STF / Associated Press

A team of Houston-area researchers has received $1 million to study a glacier the size of Florida in Antarctica that could hold the key to understanding future sea level rise.

The researchers from Rice University and the University of Houston will join others from across the U.S. and Great Britain to study Thwaites Glacier, which has experienced significant melting over the past several decades and could cause a dramatic increase in sea level if it collapses.

The five-year study, funded by the National Science Foundation, will help scientists determine how fast and how much more the glacier will melt in the coming decades. And their findings will help international communities better harden themselves against global warming.

“As communities around the world try to respond to global climate change, they can be better prepared if they know what changes are coming,” said Julia Wellner, the study’s principal investigator from UH. “While we know sea levels are rising, we don’t always know the rate and magnitude. Such information could help coastal regions around the world get ready for the future.”

Wellner’s project is one of eight that is part of the International Thwaites Glacier Collaboration, a $25-million initiative between NSF and the U.K. Natural Environmental Research Council.

One of the growing concerns of climate change is sea level rise, which could put coastal communities such as the Houston-Galveston area at serious risk in the future. Scientists have found that sea level rise is averaging less than one centimeter across the globe each year, but some believe it will have increased to more than six feet by 2100, according to a June 2017 Scientific American article.

But estimates vary greatly, in large part due to uncertainty surrounding the melting of glaciers. Scientists at the Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi's Harte Research Institute for Gulf of Mexico Studies recently calculated that sea levels in the area will have risen 2.4 feet by the year 2100.

“The greatest uncertainty in projections of future sea level rise come from the Western Antarctic, and in particular from this glacier,” Wellner said. “We’re concerned that the glacial retreat is accelerating and may be irreversible.”

Scientists hope to clear this up over the next five years. They’ll make multiple trips to Thwaites to collect sediment samples and study the floor of the ocean where the glacier used to sit before it began melting. This will help scientists determine how ice behaved in the past when faced with warming ocean and climate conditions, said Lauren Simkins, a post-doctoral research associate at Rice who also is working on the project.

“We know warm water has accessed the glacier, so what we can do is look at this record to come up with rates of retreat,” Simkins said. “We’ll be able to say, hopefully, ‘given this certain temperature change, this is how the ice has responded.’ ”

Knowing the history of ice retreat, she added, will help scientists “understand how warm water really drives retreat of the whole system.”

Their first trip to the glacier, located about 1,000 miles from both the U.S. and British research stations, will take place in January. They hope to have results starting in 2020, Wellner said, which will help scientists more accurately predict future sea level rise.

Alex Stuckey is an investigative reporter for the Chronicle. Stuckey won a Pulitzer Prize in 2017 for her work on a project examining the rampant mishandling of sexual assault reports at Utah colleges while working for The Salt Lake Tribune. She came to the Chronicle shortly thereafter to write about NASA, science and the environment.

Stuckey is an Investigative Reporters and Editors award winner and a Livingston Award Finalist. She has won a Sigma Delta Chi Award for Excellence in Public Service Journalism and a Frank A. Blethen Award for Local Accountability Reporting. She also has won a Society of Professional Journalists Don Baker Investigative Reporting Award.

An Ohio native, Stuckey has lived in five states since graduating from Ohio University’s E.W. Scripps School of Journalism in 2012. She loves yoga, reading and elephants. She shares a birthday with Ruth Bader Ginsburg (girl power!) and the late Alan Bean, fourth man to walk on the moon.